Book Review: Receipts from the Bookshop by Katie Clapham

 Disclosure / Disclaimer: I received this ebook, free of charge, from William Morrow Publishing via #netgalley, for review purposes on this blog. No other compensation, monetary or in kind, has been received or implied for this post. Nor was I told how to post about it. All opinions are my own

Based on the popular Substack that Julia Quinn calls “delightful” and India Knight describes as “absolute heaven,” a quirky and gossipy insider glimpse at a year in the life of a family-owned bookstore in a seaside English town—as told by the store’s owner.

Synopsis:

One summer not long ago, bookseller Katie Clapham began chronicling life at the small independent bookstore she runs with her mother in the English seaside town of Lytham St Annes. Her cozy bookshop diaries detail the romance and frustration of running your own bookstore - from the loyal customers to the feisty passers-by, and the deliveries filled with tempting new stock to the never-ending aftermath of cardboard boxes. Katie faithfully records the change of seasons from sad January to exhausting December, punctuated with visits from inquisitive dogs, adorable children, and people just looking for a good place to get an omelette around here.

Tender, funny, and thoughtful, Receipts from the Bookshop is a love letter to everything we hold dear: small towns, family, book chat, hot cups of tea, and just the right snack at 11 AM....

Review:

The problem with social media is that we get the problem with social media is that we get snippets of life we don't get the whole day. With this book you're getting an entire month per chapter, but it's taken from those snippets, and in this case it's rather like seeing the movie trailer with all the funny bits,and then watching the whole movie and realizing you've already seen the best parts. It's not to say it's a bad book, it just was rather meh to me. Some parts were interesting but for the most part I felt like I was just skimming because frankly it just wasn't interesting. Running a small town bookshop is a labor of love from the get-go. It's not going to make you a fortune, but it might fulfill a lifetime dream. But as we know sometimes dreams aren't the greatest thing, they just seemed like it, before we achieve them. If you're interested in what it takes to run a small town bookshop, and the perpetual issues, then you'll probably like this book. But if you're looking for a fun-filled book, this is not it.

About the Author:

Katie Clapham is the co-founder, with her mother, of independent bookshop Storytellers, Inc. in a small seaside town in northwest England. She writes the popular Substack ‘Receipt from the Bookshop’, and is the author of several books for children and young adults. Katie lives with her husband, daughter and dog in Lytham St. Annes.